Until I Met You
by ChainOfPaperclips
Summary: Modern World AU. College Freshman Emma Nolan has no love for poetry, and not even her hot Lit. professor, Killian Jones, can make her understand it. Yet as she receives a series of mysterious notes and presents, understanding unfolds in her heart, & she falls in love with the stranger sending them. But to whom does her heart belong? And will her romance end in happiness or sorrow?
1. Chapter 1

**A/N: This was originally supposed to be a one-shot Valentine's fic, using the flash scene format, as I already have a modern world AU fic featuring Killian as a professor in mind for the future. But this fic has taken on a life of its own, and there is no way I can do it justice in a one-shot, so I have decided to make it multi-chapter. And forewarning: the Valentine's part of this fic to come is only a part of the larger story, so it's more of a quasi-Valentine's fic than anything else. An actual real Valentine's one-shot is already well in the works to make it up to y'all, and will be entitled "Set on Fire."**

**Hope you like this fic!**

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Emma Nolan was glad the holidays were over. As much as she loved her mother, it was a relief to be back at college. Holidays just weren't the same since her father had died two years ago. Instead of the warmth and cheer she used to feel, all she felt was an emptiness. And though her mother tried her very hardest to pull out all the stops, to make holidays fun and memorable again, Emma knew that her mother felt the emptiness, too. It wasn't fair. Her father shouldn't have passed away so young. Shouldn't have contracted a particularly aggressive form of brain cancer that appeared very suddenly and ripped him out of their lives within a matter of four months.

College took her away from all that. Took her away from the small town of Storybrooke, Maine, where people still treated her with kid gloves and eyed her with pity all this time later. Took her away from the whispers and the gossip and the cruel remarks about how much she and her mother were grieving, or when, or how long, and why didn't they just get over it and move on already (Were they going to wallow in it forever)? Took her away from people analyzing every action she took, every word she spoke, every mood she was in: If she was happy, she wasn't processing her grief in a healthy manner; if she was mad or upset, she was morbidly dwelling on her father's death, and it wasn't like that could bring him back, you know; if she laughed, she was putting on a front, the brave girl; if she didn't go out with friends on the weekend, she was letting her mother cling to her in an unhealthy manner, and Mary-Margaret really just needed to let the poor girl have her own life; if she did go out and have fun, she was insensitive and neglecting her poor mother...and on and on it went, ad nauseum.

Emma just couldn't win as a resident of Storybrooke anymore.

But at college, no one judged her or placed any expectations on her. It was a new life, and the spring semester of her freshman year a fresh start. She was eager to begin.

Which was why she had arrived earlier than any other student in the class. And taken a seat in the front row, near the door.

"Hey!" a male voice greeted her. "Long time, no see!" Emma looked up to see Victor Whale slide into a seat next to hers, his trademark sarcastic smirk plastered across his face. "I didn't know you were in this class," he continued. "How was your winter break?" He sipped at the enormous cup of coffee in his hands and waited for an answer.

"Pure hell," she sighed. "I don't want to talk about it."

"Fair enough."

That was why Emma liked Victor so much. He didn't push. He just let her be. Perhaps that was why they had become instant friends at freshmen orientation. He respected her walls and boundaries. Often to a fault.

"So, what do you know about this professor?" Victor asked as more students trickled into the room. "Good? Bad? Jumps on furniture? Draws boxes around random words while he writes? Gorges himself on Spam and Yoo-hoo every day?"

"I have no idea," she said truthfully. "I don't even remember his name."

Victor bent over and unzipped his backpack. He rummaged around for a moment and produced a folded up piece of paper with a triumphant grin. "Ta-da!" He opened the paper and scanned it. "Professor Killian Jones," he read.

"Doesn't ring a bell."

"Maybe he's new."

"Or maybe we just don't know anybody who has had him," she pointed out, practical as ever. "Even Jefferson can't take every course in the school. He's mad to try."

Victor's eyes widened. He clutched at his chest for a moment, then cupped his ear with one hand. "Hark! What's that? Is Emma Nolan implying that we need more friends? And here I thought I was the one cheerleading for us to expand our social circle!" He made a face. "More like a triangle, really."

She snorted. "Funny. And no, it's not that."

"C'mon, Emma," he rolled his eyes. "Don't you get tired of Jefferson being the third wheel to our gorgeous coupling?" he teased, waggling his eyebrows. "Can't a fella get any time alone to romance you?"

"In your dreams," she laughed. "I'm too smart for that. You couldn't settle down with one woman if your life depended on it."

"I resent that," he frowned. "I committed to Aurora for three whole weeks."

"Yeah, and the fact that that's your best track record speaks volumes," she declared with a shake of her head. "Besides, there's Neal. He's part of our group."

Victor's expression became stormy. "That bastard doesn't count, and he never will."

"Victor-"

"He's a loser. Not nearly good enough for you."

"Yeah? Look who's talking, with some of the girls you bring back to the apartment."

"Ah," he said, raising his eyebrows. "But as you said, I don't commit to them for very long. Doesn't matter much what anyone thinks, then, does it?"

"Whatever," she snorted. "The point is that you have absolutely no room to make judgments about who I date."

Victor opened his mouth to reply, but something caught his attention from the corner of his eye, and he turned away, his mouth snapping shut. Emma followed his gaze. A slim girl walked into the room, clutching her books to her chest. Her long brown hair was fastened into two ponytails on either side of her neck, streaks of cherry red dye running through her locks. Her make-up was heavier than Emma's tastes ran, with fire-engine red lipstick and lots of black eyeliner, but she managed to pull it off without looking trampy. A feat not to be sneezed at from the short white shorts and a very form-fitting crimson t-shirt she wore.

"Roll your tongue back inside your mouth," Emma smirked. "Class is getting ready to start. You can stalk your latest conquest later, tiger."

As she said this, a hush settled over the classroom, making her words sound louder than they really were. Embarrassed, she turned toward the front of the class again, her head ducked. Amazed at the stillness, Emma wondered if this was one of those moments that you could actually hear a pin drop. She looked up from her desk, curiosity overcoming her embarrassment, and understood the utter silence immediately. Her professor had arrived. Her gorgeous _young_ professor.

He was tall, with broad shoulders and a chest muscular enough that even the jacket of his two piece charcoal suit couldn't disguise it. The jacket hung open, unbuttoned, revealing a plain white dress shirt, the presence of a tie nowhere to be seen.

_Charcoal?_ Emma thought hazily as Professor Jones opened his briefcase. Why did it have to be charcoal? She'd always been a sucker for that shade on a man.

Removing a sheaf of papers, Professor Jones closed the briefcase and scanned the room, his manner as casual and irreverent as his tousled black hair and days-old growth of facial stubble. Emma ducked her head again, certain that her face must be flushed from all the dirty thoughts that flashed through her head. Was that actually the way his hair would look after a round or five of passionate sex?

_Stop it, Emma,_ she chastised herself. _He's your professor. You have to deal with him for a whole semester. Hard to do that if you can't even look him in the eye._

"Great," Victor muttered sourly, taking in the way every pair of female eyes (and quite a few more pairs of male ones than Emma would have suspected) riveted on the professor, "there goes my chance with Red, over there."

Emma ignored him, rubbing her sweaty palms on her jeans. He was just a man. A good-looking man to be sure, but not a foreign species. Nothing to be intimidated about. She just needed time to get used to this, to him. To those damnably striking good looks.

"Good morning," her instructor spoke, his Irish accent echoing through the still room as he looked at his watch. He shut the classroom door with a soft click. "I am Professor Killian Jones. I'll be your instructor in this course for the duration of the semester. You won't need to take notes today, I'm not that cruel," he smiled. "We'll just go over the syllabus and answer any relevant questions you have, aye?"

Silence greeted him.

"Such a talkative group," he teased. "Well, I love a challenge. Let's start, shall we?"

And before Emma knew what was happening, Professor Jones was walking toward her, sheaf of syllabi in hand, an amused smirk on his handsome features. The breath whooshed out of her lungs, and her limbs suddenly felt like leaden weights. He halted to a stop in front of her desk, and she couldn't quite manage to look in the eye, despite her earlier resolution to act normal and do just that. Paper rustled, and a moment later a thin stack of papers entered her line of vision. She looked up instinctively, and found herself gazing into a pair of striking, ocean blue eyes framed by sinfully long black eyelashes.

His expression shifted as she stared at him, making a fool out of herself, and the playful amusement drained out of his features. Surprise shone on his face for a brief moment, his eyes locked onto hers, before he cleared his throat and looked away. "Miss...?" he said.

"Nolan," she managed. "Emma Nolan."

"Well, Miss Nolan," he said, eyeing her pensively, his voice soft and smooth as cream, "please share these with your classmates, aye?"

She nodded, unable to do anything else, and took one of the papers from the top of the stack. Victor smirked at her out of the corner of her eye. Emma turned to hand the stack of papers to the student behind her, shooting Victor a death glare, while Professor Jones continued to hand out the syllabi to the other rows of students. Slumping in her seat, she propped her head in one palm and scanned the course syllabus, committing it to memory.

Professor Jones began to speak, and she listened to his lilting Irish voice with one ear, going over the course description and necessary texts and materials, answering intermittent questions, while she let her mind wander. Victor's words bothered her more than she had let on. She had tried very hard to integrate Neal into their close-knit group, but neither Victor nor Jefferson had ever taken any particular liking to him, though they managed to tolerate him for her sake. Jefferson's disdain in particular went far beyond simple dislike; it bordered on, if not outright leaped over the fence into loathing. The upperclassman had taken to avoiding her boyfriend's company more and more these days; and though he used the excuse of the staggering amount of work he was under with his triple major, Emma couldn't help but wonder if her roommate was using it as a convenient means to kill two birds with one stone.

She wished she understood what it was all about, but Emma knew better than to question him. For while Victor might be willing to respect her walls and boundaries, Jefferson had never had any qualms about bulldozing right through them if he thought it was necessary. If she asked him the real reasons for his dislike of Neal, he would expect her to answer a question or two he'd been wondering about in return. And Emma wasn't willing to take such a risk.

"...turn the page, you'll see a list of recommended supplemental reading materials," Professor Jones was saying. Emma turned the page obediently and scanned the extensive list, one eyebrow raised. Beside her, Victor whistled softly. "By no means are you required to obtain or make use of these materials, as I certainly won't test you on them," the professor said, and an audible murmur of relief rippled through the classroom, "_but_," he emphasized, amusement in his voice again, "those who wish to get the most out of this class and enrich their love for poetry, as well as perhaps their mid-term paper grades," he said with a chuckle, "will dip into at least a few of them for easy comparison and contrast with the required reading."

"In other words, only optional if you want to make a decent grade," Victor moaned quietly. "This guy is intense."

Emma shrugged. She wasn't into poetry, herself. Never had been. It wasn't something she really got, and her high school literature grades reflected that struggle, at least insofar as this one area had been concerned. But even despite all of that, Professor Jone's heavy suggestion to make use of the supplemental reading materials struck her as enthusiastic rather than burdensome. There was something about his voice when he spoke about poetry, something she couldn't quite put her finger on, or describe with words, but it wasn't negative in the slightest. It was...like a five year old anticipating his birthday. Overzealous to share the cake and festivities with everyone else around him.

Professor Jones loved what he did for a living.

She looked up from the syllabus. Her eyes caught his again as he dismissed the class early, promising to see them again on Wednesday. The room erupted in a flurry of noise as desks creaked and feet scuffled across the floor, but Emma made no move to leave. She couldn't have moved if she'd wanted to. For in Professor Jones's blue eyes sparked a whisper of something that felt at once both familiar and foreign, though she couldn't for the life of her identify it. She smiled shyly, unaware of the action, until he returned it with a soft smile of his own.

She blinked, breaking his gaze, and a feeling of horror overcame her. _What the damn hell was that?_ she wondered as Professor Jones became swarmed by her female classmates, wanting to "introduce" themselves and tell him that they looked forward to learning all that he could teach them (she snorted loudly at this, zipping her backpack shut. She couldn't help herself). Victor sighed, hefting his own book bag onto the desk. He cinched it shut and glanced at her.

"Well?" he said in resignation.

"Well what?" She stood up, pulling the straps of her red backpack onto her shoulders.

"Aren't you going to join the slathering horde?" He jerked his head toward the sea of women surrounding Professor Jones, unabashedly vying for his attention. Including the cute girl he'd dubbed "Red."

"Please," she sighed. "I have my dignity." Maybe not much, after today. After she'd made a fool of herself over Professor Jones. _Twice._ But she would sure as hell preserve what little shreds she had left. "Let's go." She swept toward the door with Victor at her heels, intent to prove to herself that Professor Jones had no effect on her whatsoever, that the gazes they had shared today meant nothing. Not to her. And certainly not to him.

But despite such assurances to herself, she felt the heat of his gaze on her back as she left, just the same.

And shivered.

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**A/N: What do you think?**


	2. Chapter 2

**A/N: Wow, I'm touched by the response this fic has gotten so far! I don't think I've ever had so many favorites, follows, or reviews for a fic in such a short span of time! And with a first chapter, no less! You guys must love the Professor!Killian and Student!Emma trope as much as I do, ROFLMAO!**

**Just a quick aside: I came down with a nasty cold, and I'm writing at a much slower pace than I intended, so please bear with me. The Valentine's bit isn't going to be posted by Friday, obviously, with the shift this fic's format, but hopefully it won't bother anyone too much. Especially since this fic isn't a V-Day fic per se, but merely includes that day as part of the story, a la The House Boy. My actual Valentine's fic, Set on Fire, was posted last night, so if you want something specifically centered around that day, you can check that out.**

**I hope you enjoy this chapter! Kudos to KendraCs for giving me the idea to do Killian's POV in this fic, too.**

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Killian Jones, adjunct professor of Literature at Farrenton University, South (which the students affectionately and irreverently shortened to FU), was in trouble. And it was only the end of his first day in the new semester. Watching as the last student filed out of the classroom, he picked up his briefcase; the familiar weight of it comforted him in some small measure, even lacking the additional mass of papers he'd carried in it this morning.

The thought of his first class of the day brought a sigh of frustration. Better that he'd had that batch of students at the end of the day, he thought, flicking off the light as he exited the classroom and began his walk out of the building. He'd been a distracted mess for his last two classes; for the first time since he'd started teaching, he hadn't been able to give his students his full attention or enthusiasm. And though his new students hardly knew the difference, Killian had. Something significant had happened that morning between him and Emma Nolan, and he hadn't been the same since.

Pushing the door open, he exited the building, the late afternoon sun casting shadows on the sidewalk. He walked down a small flight of concrete steps, picking his way around a bike rack as students both former and present greeted him with sunny smiles and shy waves. Nodding at them in turn, he plastered a weak smile on his face and set off toward the nearby parking lot.

Reaching into his pocket, Killian fumbled around for a moment and then pressed the button to unlock his car door. He opened the door and stowed his briefcase on the passenger seat, taking his keys out. He slid into the driver's seat and pulled the door closed after himself. Killian put the key in the ignition, but sat staring at the meticulously-trimmed bushes on the lawn ahead of him, lost in thought. He'd never believed in God, not exactly; which was a rather funny thing, considering all that he did believe in: karma, fate, an afterlife...and soulmates.

He exhaled with a shudder. It was the last one that was going to get him in trouble, he was certain of it. The moment Emma Nolan's gaze had captured his, taking the syllabi he'd proffered her, he'd known. Felt it in his bones, his very soul. He hadn't expected to ever meet someone with that instant connection ever again. He'd always assumed that you got one soulmate in life, and that was it. If you lost your soulmate, like he'd lost his high school sweetheart and fiancé, Milah, well...shit luck for you. Perhaps you'd see them in the afterlife, or in a reincarnated life, if you were lucky (Killian had never decided which he believed to be the truth, but there was _some_ means of life after death. There had to be. He hadn't been able to bear the thought that Milah was lost to him forever).

He'd lost himself in her eyes a second time, too, right as he'd dismissed class; he'd been helpless to control the urge, utterly overwhelmed by the need to confirm the kindred soul he had sensed earlier. But what he found in the depths of her glittering green eyes the second time only pulled him into the riptide completely. Emma Nolan wasn't just his soulmate. She was a twin soul. Something far deeper and more meaningful than Milah had been to him-though he loved Milah and her memory no less for it. Emma Nolan, whose essence was both familiar and foreign to him at the same time, had completed him, filled a void in him that he'd never known was there until their souls collided.

And he'd learned something else about her, too. She, also, had suffered a deep loss in her life. He'd known it, sensed the wounds with a surety when he'd been able to lock gazes with her longer. The look in her eyes was the same look he'd seen in his own, every time he looked in a mirror. Who had it been? he wondered. Sibling? Close friend? Lover? Parent?

_Hell and damnation_, he'd thought to himself as she swept out of his classroom without so much as a word or a backward glance. She'd been the only woman who _hadn't_ approached him-a thing which both irritated and intrigued him at the same time; another shock, since he'd long grown tired of the hormone-fueled attention he received from his female students. It was always the worst at the start of a semester, or a new class, but there were always a handful of girls who remained doggedly persistent to the point of annoyance. His first year at Farrenton, he'd even had to get a restraining order against a student for stalking. _That_ had been quite the embarrassing business. Thankfully, she'd been a senior, on her way out of the school, but he'd made certain to keep it in place for a good while, just in case.

Killian leaned back with a sigh, tilting his head upward against the head rest. Closing his eyes, he tried to figure out what to do with this unexpected revelation. She was his student, and relationships with students was strictly forbidden, even if they didn't take your classes. What's more, she was several years his junior. Barely eighteen, from the look of her. And though she was the most gorgeous, alluring woman he'd seen since Milah, he couldn't have her. No matter how much her soul ensnared his, drawing him toward her. How cruel that the universe dangled her in front of him with no means to achieve a happy resolution.

A knock on his window startled him. Killian opened his eyes in confusion and saw Jefferson Hatter standing outside his car, grinning. "Oy," he sighed, sticking his key in the ignition to start his car. It roared to life, and Killian pressed the button to open the driver's side window. "Jefferson," he sighed, "why are you standing outside my window like a stalker? Don't tell me I need to get a restraining order against you, too," he teased, though his words sounded tired rather than playful.

"Saw you passed out in your car," he shrugged. "Wondered if you'd started happy hour a little early."

Killian made a face. Jefferson knew damn well that he didn't drink on days that he taught. And Killian would never get behind the wheel of a car under the influence of even the slightest amount of alcohol, much less _drive_ inebriated. "Right, cut the crap," he growled. "What do you really want?"

"Someone's touchy," he shot back. "Yeesh. Have you seen Liam? He was supposed to give me a ride back to the apartment. My car's in the shop again."

He sighed. "Probably got detained in traffic," he said, picking up his briefcase to shove it in the back seat. "Hop in. I'll take you home." Jefferson rounded the car, shouldering a leather satchel stuffed to the brim with books, papers, and other academic paraphenalia, and Killian shook his head. Jefferson was either very brilliant or very crazy to balance a Mathematics, Chemistry, _and_ Physics major; he'd never determined which it was. The kid practically lived at school; if he wasn't in class, he was in the library studying until it closed for the night.

The passenger door opened and Jefferson sat down, pulling his satchel off his shoulder with a grunt.

"Thanks," he said, pulling the door shut. "Not much going on in my classes yet," he explained, as if sensing Killian's thoughts. "Figured I'd go home and bond with the roommates a bit."

"How's that working out for you?" he inquired, peering over his shoulder while he backed the car up.

"Rather well, actually. They're a huge improvement over the last ones."

"For all that you're actually home, you might as well let your father pay the rent for a single," Killian pointed out.

"No way," he argued as they wound their way around the campus toward the nearest exit, "I need to be around people."

"Could have fooled me, with the way you bury yourself in schoolwork."

"And that is precisely the reason that I _need_ some company. Keeps me from going crazy. Besides, I come out of my cave more than you think."

Killian raised an eyebrow, doubtful, but decided not to press the issue. He turned onto the main road, leaving Farrenton campus behind. "Are you going to intern with my brother again this summer?" he inquired, for lack of anything else to say.

"Definitely," Jefferson agreed, head bobbing up and down with enthusiasm. "The more experience I get, the better it will be for my resume. And Liam's a lot easier to get along with than some of the others I've interned with. Plus, I don't have to move over the summer. I can stay here in town."

"Your roommates going to stay over the summer as well?"

"Doubt it," he replied, becoming pensive. "Victor hasn't chosen a course of study yet, and Emma is going home to her family for the summer." A chill ran down Killian's spine at the familiar name, reminding him of the encounter with his own Emma that morning. "There's a Sheriff's station she can intern at," Jefferson explained, "right in her hometown." Killian slanted a look at him. "Criminal studies," he explained.

He grinned. "She must be an interesting lass to live with."

"You have no idea," Jefferson huffed with a wide grin.

"Sounds like you're smitten. You going to ask her on a date?"

"She's already dating some asshole," he growled, his eyes darkening with anger. "Besides, it's not like that."

"Because you want it that way, or she does?"

A long silence. Killian glanced at Jefferson, who appeared lost in thought. "Both," he finally answered. "Victor and I agreed the week she moved in that our girl was hands-off. I've got a good thing going, finally, and I'm not about to fuck that up."

"Smart decision," he agreed. He turned down the little road that led to Jefferson's apartment building, thinking that Jefferson's cool practicality could be applied to his own situation. Emma Nolan was hands-off, and that was all there was to it. He'd simply have to avoid making eye contact with her until he grew used to her presence. Given enough time, he ought to be able to handle the situation better, and no one would ever be the wiser.

Killian pulled into a parking space in front of the correct building and braked, putting the car in park. He turned off the ignition. "All right, I've brought you here. Now get your arse out of my car," he ordered without rancor, a smile quirking at his lips. Jefferson rolled his eyes and opened the car door as the front door to the little rowhouse apartment opened. A familiar blonde woman stepped out, fit to be tied, and Killian felt his heart stop.

"Jefferson, get your boil-ridden ass in here," she shouted, "and clean up that mess you-" Emma Nolan halted in surprise, her words dying on her lips as she stared back at Killian with a mixture of shock and aggravation.

Killian couldn't help it. He laughed, tickled by her colorful choice of words. He had always admired a lass with a bit of fight in her, and salty language was icing on the cake, to boot.

She blushed a deep red, jamming her hands into the back pockets of her shorts. It took all Killian's self-control not to let his gaze linger on those long legs of hers. "Professor Jones," she greeted him as Jefferson stepped onto the front stoop.

"Wait, he's your professor?" Jefferson exclaimed, darting a look back at Killian. "How come you didn't say anything?" he accused Killian.

"I wasn't aware my student and your roommate were the same person," he said dryly. "Emma's not an uncommon name at Farrenton, and you weren't exactly doling out last names, back there." He glanced at Emma again, giving her a small wave. "See you in class on Wednesday," he told her, making sure not to gaze into her eyes directly. He reached across the car with one arm, slamming the passenger door shut.

_Hell and damnation_, he thought again as he drove away. It seemed fate had a hand in this situation, too. And if there was anything Killian Jones knew, you couldn't escape your fate. The only choices were to embrace it or run away from it; it didn't matter which-it found you just the same.


	3. Chapter 3

Emma slammed the front door shut, following Jefferson into the little three bedroom rowhouse apartment. "What the hell was _that_?" she demanded, angry because she had embarrassed herself in front of the professor yet _again_. Steadfastly unwilling to examine the reason such humiliation bothered her, she focused on her roommate's sin of omission. "Why didn't you tell me you knew Professor Jones?"

Jefferson carefully extricated himself from the heavy book bag slung across his torso before answering. He tossed it onto the couch, where it promptly bounced into the cushions with force and ricocheted onto the floor, spilling papers everywhere. He swore. "How the hell was I to know you had him?" he shot back, kneeling down to pick up his belongings. "If you would have given me your schedule like I asked you to-"

"I didn't even have mine!" she protested weakly, squatting down to help him. She knew this admission wouldn't exactly help her argument. "I lost it a couple days ago, and I had to get a new copy printed at the registrar's office!"

Her roommate looked up from the mess, books stacked haphazardly in his arms. "And of course you waited until this morning to get it printed, right?" he sighed.

"I thought I might find it again," she admitted with some embarrassment, picking up several pens, a couple of highlighters, and a bottle of white-out.

"Emma, for Chrissakes," he groaned, "just print the damn thing out in my room. I've told you, you're allowed to use it whenever you want."

"Do you go in my room when I'm not around?"

He blinked. "No! I'd never enter without your permission."

"Well, then..."

"Emma!" he rolled his eyes. "The permission is rather heavily implied in 'use my printer whenever you want'." He shoved the stack of books back in his bag. "I don't see what the big damn deal is." He sorted through several papers, organizing them into separate stacks.

"The big damn deal is that I'm deathly afraid I'll misplace some of your homework, or reach for something and erase an equation on that dry erase board, or screw up some chemical experiment-"

"That's what bothers you?" he laughed.

"It's not funny," Emma insisted, throwing the gathered supplies into his book bag without grace. "It makes me nervous, all right? It's too much pressure for me, just standing in the doorway. I don't know how you deal with all of it. When do you even sleep?"

He shrugged. "The time frame varies," he admitted. "But I get enough." He stuffed the last of the papers his bag and leaned it against the couch. "I'm famished. You eaten recently?"

"Not since lunch on campus."

"Great!" he clapped his hands together. "Let's order pizza!"

"Whoa, whoa! What about the mess in the kitchen?" she reminded him as he pulled his wallet out, rifling through the cash inside.

"I'll clean it up later."

"Why not clean it up now?" she countered. "Victor won't be back from his last class for a least another hour anyway."

Jefferson snorted. "I am not waiting for Victor to get back, just so I can eat. I like the guy and all, but..." He patted his stomach. "Not enough to starve myself. He can heat up leftovers when he gets home." He smiled at her. "So what do you want on the pizza?"

"Pepperoni and bacon," Emma sighed, resigned. "But you'd better clean up while we wait for it to be delivered," she insisted stubbornly. "Extra cheese," she added to the order as an afterthought.

Jefferson bobbed his head in response."Fine, fine," he placated, taking his phone out of his back pocket. He pressed a succession of buttons, dialing their favorite pizza place, and Emma flopped onto the couch, considering her professor's reaction to the tirade she'd started to unleash on Jefferson when she walked onto the front stoop. He'd laughed at her, or at least her choice of words, which confirmed the sense of humor his demeanor had hinted at in class that morning. Emma should have felt comforted by this fact, for professors with an open sense of humor were more likely to be merciful in grading or easy to approach about much-needed extensions, unlike the hard-nosed, rigid types. But something about Professor Jones's sense of humor unsettled her.

Emma puzzled over this while Jefferson set about cleaning the kitchen, pizza ordered. Curling up on the beat up old brown couch under the blue-and-grey knit afghan her mother had sent her to college with ("To make the place seem more like home," Mary-Margaret had insisted), Emma reviewed her morning in Introduction to Poetry and realized the reason Professor Jones's sense of humor disconcerted her. The instant connection she had felt with him was dangerous enough, drawing her attention and awareness toward him in a way that was altogether inappropriate. It was something she should run from, and fast.

But Professor Jones's sense of humor made that difficult, for it only made him more real to her, like a friend. Like someone her own age. Someone she could go for coffee with. Someone she could fall for.

_No, Emma,_ she chastised herself amid the sound of Jefferson sweeping up remnants of broken glass. _No, you will not go there. You won't._

She couldn't. She just couldn't. The idea was stupid anyway. It was just a crush. A horrible, inconvenient crush. But one that she worried might grow out of control if she didn't nip it in the bud immediately. She wouldn't become one of her simpering classmates. She refused to sink to that level. Emma just needed to divert her attention somehow, bury herself in the course work-distasteful as the subject was to her. And never, ever let her mind wander to the handsome young professor.

As it had for the past fifteen minutes, she realized, looking at her watch with a sinking feeling in the pit of her stomach.

_Fuck_, she thought.

Jefferson sat down on the couch next to her, slanting her a pensive look. "What's on your mind?"

"Thinking about how awkward that little scene outside was," she confessed. "I can't believe he heard me call your ass boil-ridden."

Her roommate laughed, patting her on the knee. Or the closest approximation, with the afghan covering her lap. It was more her thigh, maybe. "Don't worry about, Emma. I've heard him say far more colorful. It's not like you shocked him or anything."

She raised an eyebrow at this tidbit of information. "No," she answered after a moment, "he just laughed at me."

"And what? You're going to hold that against him or something? Emma, come on! It was _funny_." He grinned.

"Yeah, yeah, fine," she groused. "So how do you know him anyway? You take his classes?"

"Nope, not a one. Met him my freshman year-his first year teaching, by the by-when I volunteered to help him run the university's version of a dead poets society." He flushed, looking embarrassed. "There was...a girl," he admitted. "She loved that sort of thing. Thought I could win her over, if I developed an interest in it."

"Get out of town!" she shoved at his shoulder in a playful manner, grinning. "You had a life once? A crush?"

"I still have a life!" he shot back. "And I'm too busy for dating," he deflected.

"Uh-huh," she snorted. "I somehow doubt that would stop you if you met someone." He glanced at her sidelong. "Then again, how the hell you'll ever meet anyone with your impossible course load these days is beyond me." She leaned back against the arm of the couch, resting her feet in Jefferson's lap. "So. Who was she? Did you ever win her over?"

"Uh, it's...she's not important anymore," he brushed the question away with a wave of his hand. "And no, I never won her affections. She was too fixated on the Professor."

"Oh." Emma swallowed slowly, avoiding his gaze. "That sucks. I'm sorry."

He shrugged. "It's over and done with. Anyway," he continued, "he found out I was a chem major-this was before I added the mathematics and physics-and he introduced me to his brother, Liam. A good thing it was, too, or I might not have had an internship over the summer, after things fell apart at my previous internment."

"That was nice of him," she admitted grudgingly. Why did the man seem so utterly perfect, the more she learned about him?

"Yeah." An impish smile formed on Jefferson's face and Emma's eyes widened. She pulled her feet away, but Jefferson reached over and snagged one of them anyway. "You know what happens when you use me as a foot rest," he reminded her, tickling the bottom of her bare foot.

"No! No!" she gasped in between helpless giggles, trying in vain to kick him away with her other foot. "Stop! I'll get-" She hiccupped. Too late. "-the hic-hiccups, damn it."

The door bell rang, and Jefferson pushed her foot away with a grin. "Serves you right." He reached into his back pocket for his wallet.

"I-I have some-money," she managed between hiccups.

"No good," he told her. "I'm paying this round, since I'm actually home early for once. You or Victor can get the next." He opened the front door, his attention diverted while he checked their order and paid the deliveryman.

Emma inhaled deeply, holding her breath. Damn Jefferson and his story about Professor Jones, making things worse. Her phone buzzed, and she pulled it out of her pocket.

_Hey babe_, came the text from Neal. _Got 2 sweet tickets 2 a Chili Peppers concert Friday. U up for it?_

Of course. Neal. Emma expelled the breath she'd been holding. She felt ashamed that she'd temporarily forgotten about him amidst her musings about her hot new professor. Another reason she had to get over this stupid crush already. It wasn't fair to him.

Assuaging her guilty conscience, she quickly texted back, _Absolutely. Meet for coffee in the morning?_

_U got it. Pick u up at 8? When's ur first class?_

_9. Statistics. 8 it is._

_Awesome. Catch ya in the morning, princess._

The scent of hot pizza wafted toward her, and she looked up to see Jefferson peering down at her with a frown. "What?"

"Neal?" he inquired, irritation and resignation etched onto his face.

"Yeah, how'd you know?"

"Emma, it's not like you get a lot of texts from other people," he pointed out, doing an about-face and walking toward the kitchen, pizza boxes balanced on his fingertips like a waiter. "None of us are exactly...inundated with friends," he said diplomatically, setting the pizza down on the small, round table that was tucked into one corner of the kitchen. "Besides, I know the look you get."

"I have a look?"

"Yeah."

"Oh."

"Look, let's just eat and talk about something else so I don't lose my appetite."

Emma threw the afghan off her lap and shoved it aside. "All right," she agreed, standing up. "But he's picking me up in the morning, so be nice." Her roommate groaned, opening one of the boxes. "And we have a date Friday," she warned, figuring it was better to prepare him for it now, in case he and Victor had other ideas for that night. "So you and Victor can go have a boys night at the bar or something."

"Emma," he growled, jerking his head toward the piece of pizza he was holding. "Food. Appetite. Shut up."

She grinned. "Okay, okay. Jeez." She reached forward and snagged her own piece. "First one to finish three slices gets to pick the movie tonight," she challenged.

A confident glint entered Jefferson's eyes. "You're on."

* * *

**A/N: The next chapter will be the first working class, so to speak, so get ready for some poetry and lots of Killian.**


	4. Chapter 4

**A/N: The poems discussed in Killian's class are included for your reference at the end of the chapter, so you can "follow" along with the discussion if you like. **

**Just a quick note: All poems used in this fic that are **_**not**_** referenced in the text with an author are of my own creation. Please be gentle. I am not much of a poet, being better at stories, but I'm really trying for the purposes of this story. ;)**

**Now, on with the chapter!**

* * *

Killian sipped at his chai tea while his car idled in front of the grey-and-white stone cottage. He glanced up, looking for any sign of his best mate. Nothing. _Well, give it a couple more minutes_, he thought, returning his attention to the legal pad propped against his steering wheel. _He's not late yet._

He sighed, putting his tea back in the cup holder. Crossing through the previous line, he muttered to himself. "Skeletal?" he pondered, "Or ashen? Microscopic? No, I like ashen better." He scribbled another sentence, then stared at it with disgust. He'd been working on this piece for weeks, but it just wouldn't come together for him. The whole bloody thing was a mess, and the more he tinkered with it, the worse it got. Growling in frustration, he stabbed the page a bit vengefully with his pen and scratched out the entirety of the poem. The sheet tore through.

Glancing up, he checked for his mate again. "Come on, Lakeland!" He honked the horn a few times. "Hurry your arse up already!"

Killian flipped to a fresh page on his legal pad. Maybe he was over-thinking it a bit much. It certainly wouldn't be the first time. Perhaps some free writing was in order. He just needed to let his mind go, quash his inner critic, and let his subconscious take over. Killian closed his eyes, trying to clear away the recalcitrant remnants of the previous poem. Tapping his pen against the page, he opened his eyes and began to write, letting his subconscious take control.

_They tantalise, these_

_Eyes of gemstone green._

_My forbidden fruit._

Killian stared in horror at the haiku that had poured out of him. "_Fuuuuck_," he groaned.

"Well, good morning to you, too!" a voice chortled.

He started. Killian hadn't even heard the car door open. "You're late," he accused his mate, "which means if I don't speed, _I'll_ be late."

"Sorry."

Killian studied Eric for a moment, taking in his flushed cheeks, self-satisfied smile, and the twinkle in his clear blue eyes. He laughed, tossing his legal pad in the back seat of the car. "No, you're not." He shook his head, releasing the parking break. "I take it married life is still treating you very well?" Killian shifted the car into drive and looked over at Eric with a smirk.

Eric buckled his seat belt. "Extremely." He returned the smirk. "Speaking of-"

Killian groaned, signaling before he pulled out into the street. "_No_."

"Come on, Ariel says she's perfect for you!"

"That's what she said about the last dozen she's set me up with. _No_ thank you," he declared, turning out of Eric's neighborhood. "I'm done."

"If this one doesn't work out," Eric entreated, "we'll leave you alone for good, I swear."

Killian glanced over at him skeptically. "Still not interested."

"Why not? What have you got to lose besides sitting home this weekend, writing morbid poetry?"

"Hey!" he protested. "My poetry is _not_ all morbid."

"Most of it is," Eric pushed back. "Come on, Killian. That's not good for you. And it isn't going to bring Milah back. It's been ten years now since that drunken bastard collided with her and ran her car off the road. I know that's not something you ever really get over, especially since you were engaged, but she would want you to move on, not fixate on her memory and the ghosts of what-could-have-been for the rest of your life."

_Shows how much you know_, Killian thought wearily. Writing poetry was the only outlet he had to keep his lingering emotions concerning Milah from eating him alive. But Eric didn't write, had neither the talent nor the temperament for it. Nor had he ever suddenly lost someone he loved more than life itself, as Killian had. Of course he didn't understand. He couldn't, not even by association. He hadn't been there, hadn't known Killian back when it had happened, the summer after high school graduation. Hadn't been the one devastated to lose his fiancé after just two months of planning a future together. Hadn't been the one denied the chance to even see Milah one last time, because the accident had mangled her too horribly for an open casket funeral. Hadn't visited her graveside every day for months, unmindful of the rain or wind or cold, his forehead pressed against her gravestone, just to feel near to her again in some small measure.

He'd never been robbed of his beloved, his happy ending, his future, his _life_.

"I'll have you know that I wrote something quite hopeful this morning," he argued, trying to block out the horrible images that his imagination always conjured of Milah lying broken and bloodied in the ditch. Sometimes he wondered whether seeing the reality of what the accident had done to Milah would have been better than the nightmares his mind dreamed up, sleeping or not. It didn't matter. He'd never had the choice. Milah's parents had made it for him, made it for everyone, denying others any chance of seeing their daughter again, even to say farewell.

"Sort of," he finished. If longing for a forbidden fruit could be considered hopeful.

"Great. Let me see it."

"It's not finished yet," he hedged, realizing his error too late. _Dammit_. He couldn't let Eric see that haiku. He would ask far too many questions. Questions Killian did not want to answer.

"Uh-huh. I thought so," Eric said as Killian turned on to university property. "Come on. Just go on the date. Unless, of course, there's someone else you have your eye on?" he joked.

"No," Killian answered quickly, turning down the lane that would take them toward the staff parking lot that was located between his building and Eric's. _Too_ quickly. He could feel Eric's stare burning a hole through him.

"_Re_ally? That certainly sounded like a 'yes' to me, never mind word choice. Who is she?"

"No one," Killian growled softly. "Drop it," he advised. "It would never work out anyway."

"Why not?"

"She's taken." Not a lie, from what Jefferson had said.

"I see." He was silent for a while as Killian searched the parking lot for an open space. "All the more reason, you know, to get out of the house," Eric finally said. "Instead of moping."

"I do _not_ mope," he protested. "I said drop it, all right?" He pulled into a space at the back of the staff parking lot. He would have to run from here in order to make it to his classroom on time.

"Fine," Eric said, unbuckling. Killian grabbed his tea and followed suit. They exited the car in unison. "I'll drop it if you go on the date."

"Oh, for Christ's sake," he all but shouted, yanking open the rear door of his car. "Fine, I'll go on the bloody date." He placed the tea on the roof of the car and reached for the legal pad, tucking it under one arm. He grabbed his briefcase and slammed the car door shut, locking his vehicle.

"Great, Ariel has all the details," Eric informed him as Killian picked up his tea. "Call her over your next break."

Killian sighed. "What's this girl's name, anyway?"

"Bell," Eric said with a wave before setting off in the opposite direction. "Tina Bell."

* * *

Killian hurried down the hallway toward his assigned classroom. He was late, despite his best efforts otherwise. Nearly ten minutes. _Damn you, Eric,_ he thought resentfully. Killian hated being late. Particularly for his classes. He was tempted to back out of the date just to spite his mate, but abandoned the idea almost immediately. His friends would only nag him all the more. Better just to go, and shut them up for a while, because he held absolutely no illusions that Ariel wouldn't talk Eric into setting Killian up with another blind date if this one didn't work out-promises be damned. Ariel wouldn't be able to help herself. It was as if, having found her own true love, it had suddenly become her mission in life to help everyone else find theirs. Especially Killian.

"Oof!" Something knocked into his chest. Killian stumbled back, nearly dropping his tea. "Miss Nolan!" he said in surprise, when he looked up. "Are you all right?"

"Yeah," she backed away, clutching the straps of her backpack with a nervous look. "I'm really sorry! I know I'm late! I was in a hurry, and I didn't see you."

"Likewise," he nodded. "I'll let you in on a little secret, though. You're not actually _late_ if you get in there before the professor does." He looked at the door meaningfully.

Her brow furrowed. "Yeah, I guess not." She reached for the door, glancing back at him. "Sure you can manage all that?" She nodded at his full hands.

"Quite sure. But you get an 'A' for the day, just for your consideration," he joked with a smile. Oh God, had he just flirted with her? Damn it all. Flustered, he wracked his brain for something, anything, he could say to save face.

Emma smiled uncertainly. "Thanks," she told him, opening the door. "I'll probably need it."

The door swung closed after her, and Killian leaned against it, eyes fluttering closed. _Hell and damnation_, he thought, trying to collect himself. How was he going to make it through an entire semester? It was only the second day of classes, and he was already failing miserably in his resolve to stay professional in his manner toward Emma Nolan. Here he was, unintentionally flirting with her and making a right arse of himself besides.

_How in the hell am I supposed to stop behaving like this if I don't even know when I'm doing it?_ he wondered, opening his eyes. Carefully shifting his things around, he opened the classroom door. It was going to be a very long semester.

"Good morning," he greeted his students as he made his way over to the table on the opposite side of the room. "Glad to see you haven't invoked the ten minute rule," he winked, instigating a ripple of laughter. "My apologies for being tardy. Carpooling complications." He set his tea down, then his briefcase, before extricating the legal pad. He gazed around the classroom. Opening the briefcase, he stowed the legal pad inside and removed his notes before locking it up again.

Killian ran a hand through his hair as he switched into teaching mode. "Now, I hope you've all done your reading, because we're going to skip the normal preliminaries and dive right in this morning." He sauntered over to the podium and laid his papers on it. "Open your books, please. We'll start with Shakespeare's eighteenth sonnet, "Shall I Compare Thee to a Summer's Day?" I'm sure you're all familiar with it. It's one of his most famous poems. Can anyone tell me what it is about?"

A dozen or more hands shot into the air. Killian smiled in amusement. "So eager," he chuckled. "I could hardly get you to talk last time." He gestured toward an attractive brunette with red streaks running through her long hair. "Yes? And you are?"

"Ruby," she smiled, every blindingly white tooth bared and on display. Killian couldn't help but feel a little like a meal being sized up by a large predator. "Ruby Lucas."

"And what do you think this poem is about, Miss Lucas?" he repeated the question.

"Love," she said simply.

"All right," he answered, "and based on the techniques for interpretation that you read about in your course packet, how do you arrive at that conclusion?"

"The speaker calls the subject's beauty and faithfulness 'more lovely and temperate' than a fleeting summer's day."

"Very good," he approved. "And why do you say a summer's day is fleeting?"

"Because it doesn't last. It fades away, and eventually summer isn't summer anymore. It turns into autumn." She shrugged a shoulder. "The speaker even says so. 'Rough winds do shake the darling buds of May,' she quoted, 'And summer's lease hath all too short a date.' It's not constant or faithful like the subject is; it can change or fade away at a moment's notice."

"Excellent." She beamed at him, eyelashes fluttering becomingly. Killian carefully ignored that and diverted his attention to the rest of the class. "Anyone else have some insights? Perhaps offer a different interpretation?"

Hands went up again. Killian nodded at a student with loads of curly red hair. "Yes? Your name?"

"Merida," she supplied in a Scottish brogue. Killian smiled a little at the sound of it, a little homesick for his own Ireland. "I think the poem's larger message isn't about romantic love at all, but man's grasping at immortality."

"How so?"

"The structure of the poem. The speaker spends the first eight lines of the sonnet contrasting the subject with the capriciousness of nature, painting the subject as something more constant. But the speaker then goes on to seemingly contradict his own position at the close of the poem." She looked up with confident, almost challenging stare, as if daring him to contradict her.

Killian couldn't help it. He grinned, walking over to the table to retrieve his tea. He remembered Merida now. She'd cornered him for several minutes after the first class, peppering him with questions about the coursework and grading system. If he wasn't very much mistaken, she'd turn out to be his star pupil. "Go on," he directed. "Please elaborate." He sipped at the warm liquid and sat down on a corner of the table.

"It's obvious in the language the speaker uses in the final six lines of the poem: 'eternal,' 'Death,' 'fade,' 'shade,' 'time.' They all point toward the theme of loss. But instead of embracing the inevitability of death for the subject, the speaker insists that the subject 'shall not fade' or 'lose possession' of her fairness or youth." She paused. "But we all know that isn't true. Death _is_ inevitable. What really clinches the speaker's grasping toward immortality are the last two lines of the poem: 'So long as men can breathe or eyes can see,'" she recited, "'So long lives this, and this gives life to thee.'" Merida crossed her arms. "Immortality. The speaker insists the subject won't succumb to the decay of death, but live on forever because he is endowing her with a type of immortality-the 'this' in the poem."

"Excellent," Killian cut in smoothly. "A very solid interpretation." Merida smiled smugly, sitting up straighter in her chair at his praise. Ruby looked crestfallen. Killian quickly sipped his tea again, to stifle a laugh. "But what does the 'this' refer to, that gives the subject immortality?" he asked a moment later. "Anyone have ideas?" He nodded at a blonde-haired man sitting next to Emma. Killian very carefully keeping his eyes trained on the young man as he spoke.

"The poem," he said without preamble, "is the 'this' the speaker refers to. The written word survives far past the human lifespan. And life is as inevitable a thing for humanity as death. For every life that ends, another one begins somewhere else. So each time a new person, or life, reads the poem, the immortality of the poem's subject is extended. Living on in the poem is as close as we can attain to immortality, objectively speaking, as human beings." He paused. "Victor Whale, by the way."

Killian's mind flashed toward the poem he'd written about Emma that morning. "I agree," he said shortly. "Thank you, Mr. Whale." Killian's eyes slid over to Emma of their own accord, having been restrained too long. She was staring at Victor with an impressed look upon her face. Killian felt an irrational surge of jealousy until he remembered that one of Emma's roommates was named Victor. Could that be him? Victor wasn't a particularly common name these days.

"All right, let's move on to the next poem," Killian said after a brief internal debate about whether to add another layer of interpretation to the poem with its historical context. He decided against it. There would be time enough to revisit the sonnet and discuss that when they began their actual section on Shakespeare soon. For now it was enough to get his students used to supporting their interpretations with the text. That was critical. Too many of his students came to him, fresh out of high school, which was _supposed_ to prepare them for college, with no real grasp of poetry at all, much less any idea of how to support their own interpretation of it instead of pulling it from their arse.

He led them through the analyses of two other poems, each vastly different in style from the one before it, showcasing a sampling of the breadth and variety poetry had to offer. Killian took an idle sip of his tea from time to time as they discussed and argued, uncaring of the fact that it had long ago grown cold. He had long grown used to lukewarm tea over the years, sitting up into the wee hours of the morning while he scribbled out poems, heedless of time's passage until the creative fever that gripped him finally broke.

"We have time for one more poem," he decided, sneaking a peek at the watch on his wrist. "Let's go over "The Red Wheelbarrow," by William Carlos Williams." The fluttering sound of pages being turned filled his ears. Killian consulted his notes. "Now," he said, "who wants to take a crack at this one?"

Silence.

"Merida?"

The red-haired girl considered the poem before her with a frown. "Um," she said, clearly stumped herself, but unwilling to admit it, "it's an ode about the piece of equipment that lets him get his work done."

"Not exactly. It's not praising or admiring the wheelbarrow," he corrected, "but that's a good guess. Anyone else?" More silence. Killian set aside his notes and stood up. "Well, let's parse it down, shall we?" He ambled over to the blackboard. Picking up a piece of chalk, he rolled it in his hand for a moment, thinking, and then began to write.

"Thankfully," he told his students as he copied out the lines of the poem from memory, "you have the poem in front of you, so you don't have to ruin your eyes trying to read my chicken scratch." Nervous laughter rippled through the room as he copied out the last lines of the poem. "The joke was unintended, I assure you," he smiled.

"Now," he spoke up, facing his students again. "Look at the poem. What do you notice about it?"

"It's very short. Only eight lines," someone called out from the back.

"And what else do you notice?"

"The imagery," Ruby said. "A wheelbarrow, chickens, rain. The contrast of red and white. It's very rustic. Maybe the speaker is a farmer?" she guessed.

"Very likely," he agreed. "So what is the poem about? What is its purpose? What is it trying to communicate?"

"It's a meditative poem," Mulan offered. "The speaker is reflecting on 'how much depends upon' this wheelbarrow. How necessary it is to him."

"No," Merida argued suddenly, inspiration lighting in her eyes, "it's transformative. The wheelbarrow is 'glazed with rain water'. Rain is symbolic of cleansing, of change. The wheelbarrow is a metaphor. The speaker is saying that 'so much depends' on the transformation of something ordinary, this wheelbarrow, into something extraordinary that can reach beyond itself to feed thousands of people."

That lit a spark in the more soft-spoken Mulan, who pushed back with ferocity, throwing down a gauntlet in favor of her own interpretation, supporting it with a passion that suggested she were waging war itself. Merida responded in kind, her words and arguments as sharp and on target as arrows, and soon the whole class was in a massive, full blown debate over the simple, eight line poem.

Killian leaned against the blackboard with a grin, crossing his arms as he took it all in. This was what he liked to see, the debate, the passion and excitement for his subject. But there was one student, Killian noticed, who didn't join in the debate. She sat quietly at her desk instead, staring at her opened book, brow furrowed, frowning.

"Miss Nolan," he cut through the noise, "you look confused." The other students gradually quieted when they realized Killian had spoken.

Emma looked up from her book. "I don't see any of that," she confessed with a shrug of her shoulder. "It's just a poem about a red wheelbarrow."

"Hmm." He laid his chalk down and raked a hand through his hair. "Is it? Would it interest you to know that Williams never titled the poem himself, but originally published it as poem twenty-two? That the title was later added by publishers?"

Mulan looked thoughtful.

"Makes you look at the poem differently, doesn't it?" Killian went on. "Takes the focus off the wheelbarrow. Let's parse this poem down, shall we, and see what Williams is on about." He gestured to the poem scrawled across the board. "Let's go back to those lines. We noted how short they are. Succinct. Compact. Yet they all form one long sentence. One thought. But look at the way the sentence, the lines are broken up: a line of three words followed by a line with a single word." He picked up the chalk and underscored the first two lines of the poem to emphasize his point. "They are all like this. Williams is trying to tell us something with such repetition."

Killian pointed to the first line again. "'so much depends on,'" he emphasized. "The secondary lines are themselves dependent upon the first line. The structure itself _is_ the poem: This isn't about a wheelbarrow at all. It's about dependence. About relying on something outside of yourself. The acknowledgement that you can't control everything. Unforeseen events happen. For a farmer, that could be hail, pests, even drought. Before you know it, your whole-your whole life can be gone in an instant," he stumbled. "And there's nothing you can do to stop it," he finished quietly. He scrubbed a hand through his hair and checked his watch. "Dismissed."

His students shuffled out of the room. None stopped to speak with him, sensing, it seemed that something was amiss. _Dammit_, he thought. He hadn't intended to lose control like that. He never had before. Yet his discussion with Eric in the car this morning had turned his thoughts toward Milah, the circumstances of her death, and it had left him feeling raw.

Heaving a sigh, he gathered his notes together and walked over to put them away in his briefcase. He scanned the classroom out of habit to make sure nothing was amiss, and saw Emma sitting at her desk. She was watching him. _What's wrong?_ her eyes whispered, full of compassion. _Did you lose someone, too?_

_My whole world_, he answered silently, holding her gaze for a moment.

"Did you, ah, need something, Miss Nolan?" he felt compelled to ask, looking away.

"No." She scooped her books into her arms and stood up. "I was just leaving."

"See you Friday, then."

"Okay." She rounded the other desks on her trek to the door. She looked over her shoulder. Her green eyes were full of sympathy. "Friday."

He watched her leave the classroom and expelled a heavy sigh. He locked his briefcase. Perhaps his friends were right about dating. This situation was too dangerous. He needed to get out, meet someone else closer to his age. He shouldn't be so affected by Emma. _Couldn't_ be. She was his student. Off limits, no matter how much he felt drawn to her.

Killian walked over to the door and flicked the lights out. He threw away his empty cup in the wastebasket and swept out of the classroom, reaching for the cell phone in his pocket. Dialing with his thumb, he pressed the ringing phone to his ear a moment later. "Hey, Ariel," he said when the voicemail picked up, "it's Killian. Eric told me you wanted to set me up on blind date this weekend. Call me back with the details, aye?"

* * *

**A/N: Well, you got to see Killian do a little of his teaching thing. What do you think? Hopefully I wasn't too rusty with my technique, and my interpretations were relatively solid.**

* * *

**Sonnet XVIII**

**By William Shakespeare**

Shall I compare thee to a summer's day?

Thou art more lovely and more temperate:

Rough winds do shake the darling buds of May,

And summer's lease hath all too short a date:

Sometime too hot the eye of heaven shines,

And often is his gold complexion dimm'd;

And every fair from fair sometime declines,

By chance, or nature's changing course, untrimm'd;

But thy eternal summer shall not fade

Nor lose possession of that fair thou ow'st;

Nor shall Death brag thou wander'st in his shade,

When in eternal lines to time thou grow'st;

So long as men can breathe or eyes can see,

So long lives this and gives life to thee.

-/-

**The Red Wheelbarrow **

**By William Carlos Williams**

so much depends

upon

a red wheel

barrow

glazed with rain

water

beside the white

chickens


	5. Chapter 5

**A/N: This chapter was every bit as fun to write as I envisioned. Hope you enjoy it!**

* * *

Emma studied the poem in front of her, trying to make sense of it. She had already skimmed the poems for Friday's class on Wednesday night, after she had returned from a freshman mixer sponsored by the Student Union, but Emma had been too exhausted from more socializing done in two hours than she had probably done in the past two _years,_ to even begin to comprehend them. It hadn't helped, either, that her mind kept drifting to Professor Jones, and how hard the plane of his chest had felt when she'd bumped into him, how hot he had looked in his two-piece navy suit and baby blue dress shirt that brought out his eyes in a way that made them seem electric. That alone was bad enough. But no, he'd had to make it far worse during class, seating himself on the corner of a table, casual as could be, sipping tea and absently licking and biting his lips in a way that made her want to gouge her own eyes out from the frustration.

And when he had absentmindedly smeared chalk dust in his hair while standing at the blackboard explaining the poem about the wheelbarrow, Emma nearly had a heart attack on the spot. For reasons quite unfathomable, she found it intensely arousing; her lungs had closed up, and for a moment Emma quite forgot how to breathe. Thankfully, Professor Jones and everyone else had been too absorbed in the analysis to notice. Emma had never been so grateful for anything in her entire life.

But none of it, absolutely none of it, compared to the moment of intense connection they had shared after class. Spurred by the flicker of pain she'd seen in his face, heard in his voice, when he'd interpreted the William Carlos Williams poem, Emma hung behind after class. Offering vague excuses to her roommate about misplacing something important and catching up to him later, Emma had settled back into her chair, watching Professor Jones with quiet compassion while he packed up his notes and gathered his belongings together. Looking back on it, she still didn't understand _why_ the hell she had done it-what good she thought it might do, or what difference she might make.

But when he had looked up, becoming aware of her presence, their gazes locked together like two complementary pieces of a puzzle. _What's wrong?_ Emma had wanted to ask, not quite daring to do so. _Did you lose someone too?_ she wondered.

_My whole world,_ his eyes had telegraphed back with a depth of sorrow that Emma was unfortunately all too familiar with. It sent a jolt through her, his silent answer, and something in her shifted. She couldn't put her finger on what, exactly, but it was as if her entire world had just tilted on its axis, and although it should have freaked her out, this moment of understanding between them, it somehow hadn't. For the first time since her father's death, Emma felt as if someone besides her mother finally understood the pain, the loneliness from losing a loved one. And she theirs.

"You know, if you stare at that any harder, you'll burn a hole right through it."

Smiling, Emma looked up at her roommate. "Says the man who gets far more intense about his work than anyone I've ever met."

Jefferson collapsed into a seat next to her with a grin. "Guilty as charged." He reached over, swiping her book. "Let me see it. I used to be okay at this poetry thing."

"Oh?" She smiled. "Lots of practice trying to impress that girl you told me about, back in the day?"

"Something like that."

Emma leaned back in her chair, surveying her surroundings with interest while Jefferson took a crack at the poem. The pub, which was within walking distance of the campus, had been so quiet just an hour before, but now bustled with activity; students and townies crowded into it with hopes of beating the dinner rush, but ironically only contributed to it. She had only been here with her roommates a handful of times before, but Breen's was the type of place that welcomed you with open arms no matter how little you visited. The pub was cozy, and softly lit, the interior lighting casting a gentle glow on the dark wood paneling throughout. Tables of assorted sizes and shapes were crammed onto the main floor, giving the atmosphere an eclectic feel that was only amplified by the random bits of memorabilia and photographs that hung from the ceiling and walls. High-backed stools lined the long bar on the far side of the room-a bar that was said to have been brought over from Ireland itself by Darragh Breen, four generations prior, making the pub nearly as old as Farrenton University itself.

"You know, I don't think I've ever read this poem by Keats before," Jefferson commented as he read. "'Ode to a Grecian Urn' or 'Ode to a Nightingale,' sure. But not 'A Draught of Sunshine.'"

"Well, 'Ode to a Grecian Urn' and 'Ode to a Nightingale' are on the syllabus, too, among others. We're spending two class periods on Keats before we move on to Donne. So anything you can contribute is helpful."

"Mmm," Jefferson replied absently.

Emma shook her head with a smile. He knew that sound. Jefferson's mind was hard at work now, fully engaged with the poem before him. Real conversation would be lost on him until he surfaced from study mode. She gazed around the pub, her eyes falling on the bar wistfully. Although she was older than most of her freshman classmates, she was still about nine months shy of legally being able to drink. That never stopped her at parties or in the privacy of their own apartment, of course (Did it ever stop most college students?), but Breen's was said to have the best beer on tap in the whole of Farrenton; Emma longed to know if it was true.

She turned her gaze away with a sigh, and a tall figure with dark hair caught her eye. Emma's head swiveled around again, her heart beating like mad. But it turned out his build wasn't quite right (_And how do you know that, Emma?_ she chastised herself), his nose was too large, and his chin a rather too round, to be Professor Jones. _Great_, she told herself, _you're seeing him places, now, too. Get a grip! You're as bad as those simpering fools in your class. He's just a man_.

_The hottest man to ever walk the face of the earth_, a small voice nagged.

Unsettled by the direction of her thoughts yet again, Emma was quite relieved when Jefferson finally spoke.

"I think I've got it."

"Got what?" Victor wondered, plopping into a chair across from them. "Did you order yet?"

"No, we were waiting for you," Emma reminded him. She turned to Jefferson. "You were saying about the poem?"

"I think it's about having hope even when things seem dark; to not give in to despair. See, it's all in the language Keats uses-"

"You're helping Emma with her poetry?" Victor interrupted with a narrow look.

"She was stuck," he said defensively. "And you weren't here yet. Is it a crime to help my roommate out?"

"No, but shouldn't she do the work for herself?" Victor said pointedly. "She's never going to learn to analyze and understand them for herself if you _hold her hand_."

Jefferson flushed. He stole a glance at Emma. "He's right. Discussing is one thing. Giving answers is another. Sorry. I just...saw how frustrated you looked and wanted to help."

She sighed. "It's fine. It's my fault; I shouldn't have let you. But I just don't get this poetry stuff. How can you discuss a poem if you don't know what it's about?"

"You've read the interpretation techniques in the packet?" Victor asked with an arch of his brow.

"Yes. Five times, at least," she griped. "But I can't put it all together like everyone else does. I mean, I circle and highlight things that stand out to me, but I can't put it together into a coherent synthesis. It's like one of those collages made entirely out of pictures of people. Everyone else looks at the collage and sees this great, elaborate picture. But all I see is a jumbled mess of strangers' pictures."

"It's still early," Victor mused, "it will get easier with time."

"Maybe," she said dubiously. "I had trouble with this in high school, too."

"You could always approach Professor Jones after class," Jefferson suggested. "Or during office hours. I'm sure he'll be glad to help. This stuff is his passion."

"I've noticed," she smiled. "Come on, let's order. I'm starving."

Dinner was an entertaining affair for the three roommates; what it lacked in alcohol, it more than made up for in boisterous laughter and wisecracks. They were having so much fun that none of them felt like heading home so early, studies be damned, and they piled into Jefferson's newly repaired car. Things quickly switched from merry to heated, however, once choosing a radio station became an issue. Jefferson, who favored hard rock, had almost no common musical ground with Victor, who listened mostly to classical. Emma's own musical tastes lay somewhere in between, so perhaps it was for this reason that she finally hit upon a compromise.

"Here," she said, interrupting their argument as she slipped a CD into the car's CD player from where she sat, riding shotgun. "This ought to please you both."

"What is it?" Victor asked suspiciously, leaning forward from his seat in the back.

Emma hid the CD case underneath her coat, away from his view. "Just listen," she advised, turning up the volume as it began to play.

"Emma! What is this? An audio book?" Jefferson wrinkled his nose as people began speaking in booming voices. "About...an auction?"

"Give it a chance. Just-there we go," she grinned as the overture blasted through the speakers, the strains of a rock influence melding with the operatic music into something absolutely magical that gave her chills every time she heard it.

"What is this?" Jefferson asked after a moment, his voice soft.

Emma glanced over at her roommate. His expression was faintly surprised, almost entranced. "Phantom of the Opera," she answered, peering into the rearview mirror for Victor's reaction. Her other roommate had settled against the back seat, his eyes closed, with his hands folded in his lap, a faint smile on his face.

"It's...incredible," Jefferson said after a moment. He smiled over at her. "Thanks for helping us to not kill each other."

"No problem," Emma sighed, letting herself relax and be swept away into the story.

The three roommates cruised around town for a while, listening to the entirety of the two-disc soundtrack, only pausing once to fill Jefferson's car with gas during the natural intermission between discs. A lively discussion followed its conclusion, leaving the roommates feeling rather energized and raucous, so Jefferson pulled up to a drug store and parked the car. "Everybody out!" he called, opening his door.

"Wait, why are we here?" Emma asked, confused.

"Haven't you ever just stopped someplace random to mess around and have fun?"

"Umm...not really."

"Then you're gonna learn tonight," he informed her, locking the car after everyone was out. "Come on."

What followed was a rather amusing display from her male roommates. Although Jefferson swore Emma needed to join the fun, too, it wasn't long before the guys fixated on the toy aisle, throwing plastic balls back and forth, and setting off sound effects on electronic toys, forgetting all about bullying her into doing the same. She hung back, watching for a while, laughing to herself at their antics, before she remembered that she legitimately needed something while she was here.

Emma told them where she was going, but they didn't seem to hear her, being too preoccupied with dueling each other up and down the aisle with plastic swords. Shaking her head, she wound her way to the other side of the store, humming bits of the soundtrack to herself. Turning down the aisle that contained the feminine products she needed, Emma stopped dead in her tracks, staring in horror at the spectacle before her.

Professor Jones stood at the other end of the aisle, wearing sneakers, a pair of dark, form-fitting blue jeans, and a Metallica t-shirt that showed off the muscles of his arms and chest all too well. He couldn't have looked more like sex on legs. A fact that was unfortunately glaringly reinforced by the display of condoms he stood near, tapping on his phone furiously with one thumb, an intense look of concentration on his face, while he held a small basket in his other hand. Emma swallowed, mortified and humiliated. She edged backwards, hoping to make a stealthy retreat before he noticed her, but only succeeded in knocking over a display of half-off tampons.

"Shit!" she cursed under her breath, feeling her cheeks flame with embarrassment. She turned quickly, stacking the boxes on the shelf in a haphazard fashion.

"Emma?" he called from close behind her. She froze. "Miss Nolan?"

_Shit._ She turned, offering him a weak smile, but couldn't quite meet his eyes. She stowed the last box of tampons back on the shelf. Her gaze couldn't seem to settle, period. Everywhere she looked, from the bit of chest hair that peeked out from the neck of his t-shirt to the soft pinkness of his lips, made her blush harder. Uncomfortable, she shifted on her feet. "Uh, hi," she replied, eyes darting over to the basket he held. Oh God, were those condoms inside of it with the aspirin and the band-aids? They were! _Large?_ she thought, trying not to notice the size and failing miserably. _Oh Jesus._ She looked up without thinking, and her eyes met his.

He blinked at her in confusion for a moment, then followed her gaze down to the basket. His eyes widened, and his gaze snapped back up to hers. He looked like someone had just jabbed him with a cattle prod. His cheeks tinged a rosy hue, his ears a deep pink. "Well, this is awkward."

Emma couldn't help it. She giggled. He blinked at her again, looking almost humiliated for a moment, then started to laugh himself.

"Killy?" a deep voice intoned from behind him. "Did you get the formula?" Professor Jones turned to peer over his shoulder. A tall, muscular man nearly as handsome as her professor stood nearby, wearing khaki pants and a navy button down shirt. He leaned over, placing a bottle of massage oil in the basket before he took it away. "Why didn't you get the formula?" He frowned at the sparse contents.

_Oh God_, Emma thought, looking from one to the other, taking in their familiarity with each other. _He's gay_. It all made sense. The nickname. The way they stood so close to each other. The condoms and massage oil. _It figures_, she told herself with a mixture of disappointment and relief.

"You didn't answer my texts. I didn't remember which kind Miri took."

"Never mind," the other man huffed, selecting a container off the shelves nearby. "I'll get it," he grumbled, putting it in the shopping basket. "Elsa will murder me if I come home with the wrong kind. Then I'll _never_ get laid."

"Liam," Professor Jones hissed.

"What? It's been almost four months-"

"Liam!"

"What?" He looked up with an irritated expression. "Oh," he said simply, when he caught sight of Emma, standing awkwardly in the middle of the aisle. "I'm sorry, I didn't realize a lady was present," he cleared his throat in embarrassment. "My apologies...?"

"Emma," she supplied, holding out her hand. "Emma Nolan."

"Liam Jones," he returned in kind, giving it a hearty shake. "Killian's brother."

_Brother? _ Not a lover or spouse, then."Oh," she said aloud, remembering that Jefferson had mentioned a brother. She felt foolish. "Pleased to meet you."

"Likewise," Liam told her with a charming smile. He glanced at his brother. "She's pretty, Killy."

"Oh, um-" she began.

"She's not-" he stuttered.

"It's not like that," they finished together.

Their eyes met. They stared at each other. Emma bit her lip, uncomfortable. What the hell was going on?

Liam looked from his brother to Emma again, his expression heavily skeptical. "I'm going to go pay," he said, lifting the basket a little for emphasis. "I'll meet you back in the car," he told his brother. He turned to her again. "It was very nice to meet you, Emma. I hope Killian brings you around the house sometime."

"Jesus Christ, Liam," he groaned, as his brother retreated. His face and ears were impossibly red, and Emma couldn't blame him. She knew hers couldn't be much better. An extremely awkward silence settled between them, the muffled sounds of her roommates' antics from several aisles over a welcome distraction. "Um," he said at last, scratching the back of his neck with an index finger, "now that we both know more about my brother and his love life than we ever wanted to know, let me offer my deepest, sincerest apologies."

"It's okay," she mumbled.

He arched a brow. "Emma, if you wanted to transfer out of my class after this, I wouldn't blame you one bit." He paused. "_I_ want to transfer out of my own class after this." They both laughed, and the tension eased somewhat. "I really am sorry," he apologized again. "Liam, he has, er, relationships on the brain lately," he said with a crooked smile, "adjusting to fatherhood and all. I'm afraid it makes him, um, assume things-"

"So...you have a niece, then?" she interrupted, intent on avoiding any reference to Liam's embarrassingly correct intuition when it came to sensing her attraction to his brother. "Miri, was it?"

He nodded, looking proud. "He and Elsa-that's his girlfriend-let me babysit sometimes. Liam's, um, asked me to sit for them again next week, in fact. To surprise Elsa with a night off." He glanced back over his shoulder. "I should be going. Liam's waiting to drop me off at my place, and Elsa will worry if he's not back soon."

"Okay."

He looked at her with a searching expression. "I'll see you tomorrow?" he inquired tentatively. "Or will you be knocking down the door to the registrar's office tomorrow morning?"

"I'll be there," she agreed. "Victor would never let me hear the end of it if I transferred out, and there's no way in hell I'm ever telling him about this."

"No," he grinned, "I suppose not. Perhaps it's best that we pretend it never happened, ourselves."

"_Definitely_."

"All right, then, Miss Nolan. See you in the morning." He turned to leave the store, tossing her a small wave as he looked at her over his shoulder. Emma watched him retreat, inhaling deeply. She grasped the shelf next to her, hoping her knees wouldn't give out. What the fuck was _that_, even? What the hell was her life, that this kind of humiliation happened to her?

"Emma!" a voice interrupted her thoughts. "There you are!"

Jefferson stood behind her, flanked by Victor. "You ready to go?" the upperclassman asked. "You and Vic have to get up early, right?"

"Yeah," she sighed. "Yeah, we do. Let's go home."

And it wasn't until the three roommates reached home a short while later that Emma realized she hadn't ever purchased her tampons after all.


	6. Chapter 6

**A/N: Egads! What a long chapter! Longer, even, than I anticipated. I hope there aren't too many mistakes, because I am up way too late, and I couldn't find them right now if my life depended on it. I'll fix them later.**

**Hope you enjoy this chapter!**

* * *

Killian pried open the passenger door to Liam's black sedan, fuming with the backwash of humiliation and sexual frustration. He plunked into the seat and slammed the door shut after himself. "What the hell," he growled, "was _that_? What the fuck is the matter with you, Liam?"

"Sorry," his brother apologized with a shrug, starting the car. "I didn't realize she was there."

"'Sorry' doesn't exactly erase that incident from her mind _or_ mine," he pointed out with a glare.

"Look, Killy-"

He groaned. "For God's sake, Liam. I'm not five. Give it a rest already. I'm nearly thirty."

"Fine," his brother sighed, peering over his shoulder as he backed out of the parking space, "_Killian_. If it's any consolation, I doubt she will hold it against you." He waggled his eyebrows up and down.

Killian bristled. "What the hell is that supposed to mean?"

"It means you should ask her out on a date."

He inhaled sharply, choking a bit as he did so. "Liam, you have no idea what you're saying."

"No, but I know what I'm seeing. Ask her out, Killian."

"She's got a boyfriend. And she's too young for me."

Liam frowned. "She didn't look it," he mused. "Maybe it was the lighting," he admitted. "Boyfriend, you say?" He shook his head as he turned the car out of the parking lot and onto the main road. "Shame. Still, that never stopped you with Milah."

Killian eyed his brother sidelong. "Is my love life, or lack thereof, really so desperate that you, of all people, are advocating interfering in a relationship? I seem to remember a long speech about 'bad form' back in high school, when I romanced Milah away from that arsehole, Bobby Gold."

"Come on, Killian. I didn't understand how poorly he treated her, back then. Was it still bad form? Yes. There's no getting around that. But she was well rid of him. And you made her happy, Killian. I just...after everything that has happened, I have a different perspective, now." He shrugged. "A few years difference doesn't mean much in the end, if two people really care about each other. If you like this Emma, and you think she could be the one-"

Killian cleared his throat and shifted in his seat uncomfortably. "Liam, she's a student._ My_ student."

"_Oh_." A long silence followed, during which Liam glanced at him speculatively from time to time. "Well, that does complicate things beyond the usual," he finally said.

He stared at his brother in disbelief. "Thank you for your vote of confidence in being able to maintain a professional distance," he spluttered, embarrassed and indignant.

Liam's lips twitched into the ghost of a smile. He glanced at Killian. "I know you, brother. I know how you think and what you believe with regard to destiny and stuff. You have a romantic's soul, and something like that isn't easily extinguished." He sighed. "But most of all, I know how hard you fall, and how deeply and utterly you love. It's something I didn't grasp until Elsa."

"Liam, sod off, all right?" he growled. "It isn't love. She's my student."

"Maybe," he conceded, "at least not yet. But I know what I saw back there, Killian."

"You're imagining things," he grumbled, insisting more because he wished it were true than because it carried any real conviction. "I happen to have a date tomorrow night with someone else."

Liam raised an eyebrow, eyeing him with skepticism. "So you say. But Killian?"

"What?" he asked tiredly.

"Don't get caught."

* * *

Killian arrived at Farrenton early on Friday morning, in part because he wanted to make up for his own tardiness on Wednesday (which, although it didn't make a difference in his students' minds, it made his own rest easier), but also in hopes of catching Emma's initial reaction when they saw each other again. He hadn't forgotten last night's humiliating incident, no matter what they had agreed to attempt, and he wanted to gauge whether the awkwardness between them was enough to push her to drop his class after all. The last thing he wanted was for her to feel as if she needed to bolt, just because his arsehole of a brother had taken advantage of Killian's daydreaming and left him holding his basket, while he shopped the store for items Killian was still doing his best not to remember. And then to add insult to grievous injury-

Suffice it to say, Killian hadn't forgotten his brother's words. Any of them. And though it would probably be best for all concerned if Emma did drop his class, he felt a little ill and anxious at the thought of her doing so.

When Emma finally rolled into the classroom just two minutes before class began, with Victor at her heels, Killian breathed a sigh of relief. Furtively wiping his sweating palms on the legs of his trousers, Killian stepped out from behind the podium and went to open his briefcase in preparation for class. He glanced up, scanning the classroom to make a mental note of which students were present. When he reached Emma, their gazes locked for a moment, and she flushed, shifting in her chair. Killian felt his own face grow hot. It wouldn't do for someone to notice their reaction to one another and leap to the wrong conclusion for the right reasons. He pivoted on his heel to face the blackboard, scrubbing at the nape of his neck self-consciously. But not quite before he noticed a shy smile creep across her face-and sensed an answering one slide across his own.

He was playing with fire. He knew it all too well. But he couldn't stop himself from drawing nearer, as close to the warmth as he dared. Even if it meant getting burned in the end as a result.

* * *

Killian Jones was bored. It was a strange phenomenon, given that he was at the concert of one of his favorite bands, the Red Hot Chili Peppers. But whereas he normally enjoyed the pulse of music so loud it made your teeth vibrate, even accepted the close press of bodies dancing with frenzied excitement, Killian found himself sneaking glances at his watch, his erstwhile date otherwise occupied by the show on stage. The sweat that beaded his skin, which normally heightened his libido and compelled him to find a dark corner with his date, did nothing for him tonight. There was nothing, not even the slightest spark with Tina that he might explore and attempt to ignite into something more.

Oh, they got on marvelously enough, and had loads in common. Ariel had been right about that. But Killian felt no pull, no connection with Tina. No chemistry. Not even when they had kissed on the steps outside the restaurant where they'd eaten dinner. To be perfectly honest, it had felt like kissing a relative. Affectionate, but wholly unappealing in any romantic sense.

They had both laughed afterward, Tina reaching the same conclusion as he, but Killian, ever the gentleman, had insisted they continue on to the concert together as friends. No sense in letting Ariel's tickets go to waste, he'd figured. Now, watching Tina dancing with a total stranger, he wondered if he wouldn't have been better off giving her both tickets and cutting out of the concert altogether. He could be home relaxing in front of the TV with a beer, maybe a glass of rum, and writing. The concert wasn't half as fun without someone to hold close, to dance and actively share it with. Someone like-

_Damn you, Liam,_ he thought darkly. Rather than reinforcing Killian's resolve to maintain the necessary professional distance with Emma, his brother had practically encouraged him to pursue it. What the hell had ever happened to overprotective older brothers who tried to instill unwanted wisdom in little brothers?

Milah and her tragic death had happened, apparently.

Killian sighed, turning toward Tina to bid her farewell. Might as well call it a night, so far as he was concerned. But someone crashed into him as he moved, his balance faltering for a moment as something wet splattered across his front. Including his leather jacket. "Fuck," he growled, swiping hand across the leather to dispel the liquid.

"Oh, God! Professor Jones! I'm so sorry!"

Killian glanced up quickly at the familiar voice. Emma stood just behind the shoulder of an incensed-looking young man with scraggly brown hair and the beginnings of a beard. He precariously held two bottles of beer in each hand, fingers twined around the necks and rims, his glassy brown eyes boring into Killian with instant dislike. "Who the fuck are you?"he demanded. Even several inches away, Killian could smell the stench of alcohol on his breath.

Killian arched an eyebrow. He turned his attention to Emma, who looked away with an embarrassed flush to her cheeks. _I believe the lady just specified who I was, had you been sober enough to pay attention_, he thought darkly, unwilling to embarrass Emma further by saying so. Instead, he spoke up, "Killian Jones. Professor of Literature and Poetry and Farrenton. And you are?'

"This is Neal," Emma interjected. "My boyfriend."

Killian opened his mouth to say that he was pleased to make Neal's acquaintance, just out of sheer habit, but he wasn't, really. He snapped his mouth shut. His eyes traveled down to the beers in Neal's hands, and he frowned.

"You know what? I don't care who he is," Neal sneered to Emma. "He made me spill my beer!" He glared at Killian again. "You're going to pay for these, you know!"

"And how are you going to make me do that?" Killian shouted over the crescendoing music. He watched Neal with disdain. "I do believe you're underage. You shouldn't be in possession of any beer at all."

"Oh, so what?" Neal shot back belligerently, with a roll of his eyes. "You're going to turn me in? Lighten up."

"Neal!" Emma hissed, a stricken look on her face. "Stop it! He's my professor!" _I'll pay for the jacket,_ she mouthed over her boyfriend's shoulder. He waved a hand at her dismissively and gave a slight shake of his head.

Neal darted a glance back at Emma, then turned his attention back to Killian. His eyes narrowed as he studied Killian from head to toe, assessing him. "_You're_ Emma's professor?" he said suspiciously. He glanced at Emma again. "How come you didn't tell me about him?" he accused.

"What? I told you about him!"

"You didn't tell me he looked like _that_!"

Killian bristled at his tone.

"What the hell does that have to do with anything?" she replied, her expression a mixture of confusion, anger, and humiliation.

"Oh, come on, Emma!" Neal began, "You can't tell me you don't want to fu-"

"Hello!" Tina's voice said brightly, stepping up beside Killian during a lull in the music, and managing to catch his hand in her own before it could swing through the air and connect with Neal's jaw. She squeezed it pointedly, and Killian winced a little at the amount of pressure she used. Their eyes met, and he nodded once, unclenching his hand. "Aren't you going to introduce me, Killian?"

"Emma, Neal...this is Tina Bell." He hesitated. "My date for the evening," he finished, with a flash of guilt that he shouldn't be feeling at all. But then, the jealousy that gnawed at his insides at the sight of Emma with Neal shouldn't exist, either. Perhaps most alarmingly, however, his overriding emotion wasn't either of these things, but rather a large measure of disgust. Jefferson had certainly been correct in his assessment of this creep. Emma deserved better. Far better. Never mind that it couldn't be himself.

Some of the anger deflated out of Neal as he eyed Tina up and down, checking her out. "Date, huh?" His brown eyes glittered with appreciation, lingering far longer than necessary on Tina's long legs and short leather skirt. Hurt and jealousy flashed across Emma's face as her boyfriend ogled Killian's date, but her expression became carefully blank a moment later.

Killian's nostrils flared, and he clenched his teeth together. He couldn't believe the sodding nerve Neal had, disrespecting Emma like he did. He was completely unworthy of her. If she had been Killian's, he'd never take his eyes off her, never have eyes for anyone else. Incensed at the insult to Emma, and irritated by Neal's lecherous attitude toward Tina, Killian felt the muscles in his arm tense as his hand balled into a fist again. He felt Tina's hand squeeze him again. Hard.

"Yes," Killian answered the other man shortly.

Neal shook his head with regret, his eyes on Tina's breasts. He licked his lips, and Killian nearly slapped him, Tina's not-so-subtle measures to rein in his temper, aside. "Well, we should get going, babe," Neal said, finally looking back at his girlfriend, "if we ever want to find Tamara and Greg again in this crowd." He set off without so much as a goodbye, leaving Emma to stutter an apology on his behalf.

Murmuring that it had been a pleasure to meet Emma, Tina slipped back into the crowd, leaving them alone. Or as alone as they could get in a crowd so large. "Um," Emma began, "I'll see you on Monday, then."

"Just a moment," he said, snagging her by the arm as she tried to retreat. She stared at him with wide green eyes. "Emma, who is driving you home tonight?"

She blinked. "I-I'm driving, I guess. Or Greg or Tamara."

He frowned, leaning over her, his head bent down until their faces were just inches apart. Resisting the impulse to kiss her, he sniffed her breath. "No, I don't think you should drive, either."

"I'll be fine in a couple of hours," she insisted. "You-you're not going to rat us out for drinking, are you?"

"That's an issue quite a bit further down my list of concerns right now," he told her sincerely. "I don't think you should drive, just to be safe. And I damn well don't think you should get in a car if Neal or his friends are driving," he spat. "Because he will certainly _not_ be all right to drive for some time, and if his friends are anything like him, neither will they."

"Look, I know he made a bad impression; he's had too much to drink, yes. But he's not usually like this. We'll be fine."

He narrowed his eyes. "Listen, Emma, I know it's hardly my place to offer any sort of advice pertaining to Neal, but a woman should never have to make excuses for her man, hmm? That's usually not a good sign."

She opened her mouth to argue with him, offer more excuses, he had no doubt, and he raised an eyebrow. "Why does everyone seem to dislike Neal so much?" she said instead.

"Given the way he just behaved, I can't imagine," Killian said mildly. Her expression became troubled. "Look, Emma...just promise me you won't get into a car with him or his friends, all right?" Killian dug into the pockets of his leather coat and retrieved a business card and a pen. He scrawled his cell number on across the back of the card. "If you need a ride, call. Or if that's too awkward for you, at least ring up Jefferson or Victor to pick you up."

"What about your date?" She glanced at Tina.

"Fizzled out early," he admitted. "We're just friends. She brought her own car, anyway." He gazed down at her beseechingly. "Please. I need to know you'll be safe." _I need to know you won't end up like Milah,_ he thought, his heart constricting with grief.

She pulled her arm away and pocketed the card with a frown. "I gotta go," she mumbled.

Killian watched her disappear into the crowd with a frown of his own. Knots of dread cinched inside his stomach. Neal was bad news, he could feel it. But he could feel the sense of wrongness, of impending doom even more. It was the same sense he'd felt before Milah died, though he'd been all the way across town at the time, ignorant of her accident. Killian hadn't been able to do anything to avert that disaster, to save her. And now it looked as if he hadn't made a difference with Emma, either.

But he wouldn't leave. Couldn't. Not if there was the slightest chance that she might need him. So Killian stayed put where he was.

And worried.

* * *

The concert was nearly over when his phone buzzed in his hip pocket of his jeans. His fingers fumbled to retrieve the phone, heart thumping erratically. Killian peered at the screen. Unknown caller. He swallowed and pressed 'talk'. "Hello?" he said, plugging a finger in his other ear, to muffle some of the noise surrounding him.

"Can I still get that ride?" Emma inquired, audibly upset. Heaven above, Killian thought as she sniffed through the phone, was she crying? Had that bastard made her _cry_? "Jefferson's phone went straight to voicemail," she babbled, "and Victor isn't answering his."

"Of course," he told her. "Where are you at?"

"Um, just meet me at the south entrance," she decided.

"Ten minutes," he promised her. "See you then." He ended the call, staring at the screen of his phone in relief. Shoving the cell back into his pocket, Killian approached Tina, who was dancing with a tall, red-haired man. Killian ignored the glare shot his way and pulled Tina aside. "Listen, Emma needs a ride," he told her over the music. "I'll see you around, aye?"

"Of course." She hugged him tightly. "I wouldn't have it any other way. Bye Killian!" She waved at him merrily and then turned back to her glowering suitor.

Relieved, Killian excused himself with haste and threaded his way through the sea of people, feeling rather like a fish trying to swim upstream. Just over ten minutes later, he entered the lobby near the south entrance of the building and scanned the area for Emma. She sat slumped against a wall near the doors, her red coat a stark contrast to the whiteness of the walls. "Ready?" he asked her, removing the keys from his leather jacket.

"Yeah."

Killian opened the door and ushered her through. She shot him a confused look as she passed by, and his grip on the door tightened. He followed behind her until they reached the sidewalk at the bottom of the steps."My car is this way," he said, briefly placing a hand on her shoulder to steer her in the right direction. She looked at him in mild surprise, and Killian flushed, glad that it was dark enough to disguise his embarrassment a bit.

He led her through the parking lot in silence, reminding himself to stay on his best behavior. They reached the car a few minutes later, and Killian pressed the button on his key ring to unlock its doors. He reached around her as she moved toward the passenger side of the vehicle, opening the door for her. Emma blinked at him in surprise, immobile for a moment. Killian ground his teeth together at the implications of her reaction. This was twice now that she had been caught off guard by basic gentlemanly manners.

Silently cursing Neal with every swear word in the book, plus a few made up additions, he waited for Emma to seat herself in the passenger seat. He closed the door and rounded the car to the driver's side. He opened the door and put the key in the ignition. Pulling the door shut after himself, he buckled the seat belt across his lap and chest. Glancing over at Emma, he noted with approval that she had already buckled herself. He started the car.

"Thank you," she said quietly, breaking the silence.

"Not a problem," he told her, looking over his shoulder as he backed the car out of the parking space. "It's not the first time I've played designated driver to a student." He paused. "Admittedly, none of them have ever been female, but..." He shrugged.

She smiled slightly. "Worried about starting rumors?"

"And jealous boyfriends, yes."

She winced. "I'm really sorry about Neal."

"Neal's the one who should be sorry for treating you so poorly," he stated with more force than he'd intended.

"Yeah, well...we had a fight." She sighed. "I'm not sure where this leaves us." He saw her rub her forehead, out of the corner of his eye. "I guess we'll figure that out when he's sober again.

Killian said nothing, turning out of the parking lot and onto the main road. Though he would be overjoyed and relieved if Emma broke up with Neal, he wasn't going to overtly encourage it, either. Not unless he was either asked to (and why would he be?), or Emma indicated some type of more serious circumstances that necessitated his involvement.

He'd made his distaste for Neal clear enough already.

"So why me?"

"Beg your pardon?" he blinked, his eyes still focused on the road ahead.

"Why change your, um, rule? For me?"

He shrugged. "It's never been a rule, exactly. If one of my other female students needed a ride, rather than drive intoxicated, I'd give her one. But I don't happen to spend a lot of time in their company, so-" He trained off. "Mostly, I've given rides to Jefferson, or some of Liam's other interns. No one I've ever taught."

"Until now."

"Aye." He paused. "It's more important to get you home safely than dealing with a few rumors if anyone see us together." He sighed, gripping the steering wheel more tightly. He'd dealt with worse, back when he'd had to get that restraining order in his first year teaching at Farrenton.

Killian drove in silence after that, and it wasn't until he helped her out of the car and walked her up to the front porch of her row house that either of them spoke again. "Dammit!" she said suddenly, keys dangling from her hand, staring at the front door. "Of all the nights for Victor to get his freak on!"

He glanced the front door. A tie was knotted to the handle. He stepped closer and picked up the long end, dangling free, and chuckled. "Good for him."

"What?"

Killian scratched at the scruff that downed his cheek, smiling. "I recognize this tie. It's not Victor in there having fun, darling."

"Are you _kidding_ me?" she burst out.

"Afraid not, darling."

"Now what do I do? His phone is turned off, going straight to voicemail. Should I knock?"

"You could try," he shrugged. "But consider the consequences if you do."

An uncomfortable look flitted across her face. "Yeah. _No_," she decided abruptly. "I'll just...leave him a text. He'll get it when he's...done."

"That might be quite some time," he pointed out. "Especially since it's, ah, been a while, from what I've gathered in passing conversation."

"Oh God," she groaned. "Just stop." He chuckled, plunking himself down on the steps leading up to the porch. "What are you doing?" she inquired with a puzzled expression.

"Well, I'm not about to leave you sitting alone in the dark," he pointed out, "especially at this hour."

"It's not completely dark," she argued. "There's the porch light." He glanced at the dim light skeptically, and she settled down on the steps next to him with a wry smile.

Killian became intensely aware just how close she was, forced to closer quarters with him by the railing on either side of the narrow steps. He licked his lips, rubbing the back of his neck.

"You're really into this whole gentleman thing, aren't you?"

"Is that a problem?"

Emma shrugged. "I don't know. I'm not used to it."

"You should be."

Her green gaze slid over to his. Killian held it for a moment._ You deserve so much better_, he told her silently. Killian sensed, rather than saw, the flush of her cheeks as she looked away. He smiled, pleased to have such an effect on her, inappropriate though it might be. Appropriate had gone out the window quite some time ago. And Killian found that he didn't altogether care if it had.

"So what does a Professor of Literature and Poetry-" She used air quotes to emphasize the title with smile. Killian groaned inwardly, smiling back. "-do for fun, normally? Besides babysit his niece, wear leather jackets, and attend rock concerts?"

He grinned. "Read."

"That figures," she agreed. "What else?"

He shrugged a shoulder. "Same as most other chaps, I suppose. Watch sports. Visit the bar on occasion. Sometimes a museum. I'm a rather boring person, when you get to know me."

"I doubt that," she snorted.

He smirked at her. "Do you?" He leaned in close, instincts overriding his good sense.

She locked gazes with him again. " Yeah."

They stared at each other for several heartbeats, Killian's breathing becoming ragged, until he finally looked away. "Well," he cleared his throat, "perhaps I travel a bit now and then, as well."

"Where to?"

"In the summer? Back home to Ireland a few times. During the school year, it's mostly places I can drive to over the weekend. Manhattan, Boston, and the like. Depends on my mood."

"Do you go to any of the Broadway shows when you visit Manhattan?"

"Sometimes."

"Hmm. What's your favorite musical?"

He considered the question. "Currently running or overall?"

"Currently running."

"Rock of Ages," he winked at her.

"Come on!"

"It is."

"No, it's not!" she huffed. "You're lying. See, I have this thing when I can sense lies. Victor and Jefferson call it my superpower." She rolled her eyes. "And you, my friend, are lying through your teeth."

"Been paying a lot of attention to my mouth, have you, to notice my teeth?" he deflected with the irreverent flirting that had long ago become habit to push people away.

She rolled her eyes. "Please."

"Wicked."

"Still not the truth."

He sighed. "Perhaps I don't like to say."

"Obviously."

"How about this? I'll tell you mine, darling, of you tell me yours," he said. Unfairly so, since he already had a good idea what hers might be, after hearing her hum it in the drug store, just before he'd noticed her.

"It must be really embarrassing," she decided. "Matilda?" she wondered with a cheeky grin.

It was his turn to roll his eyes. "God, no!"

She poked him playfully. "Come on, it can't be that bad!"

"Bridges of Madison County," he answered hoarsely, mesmerized by the sway of her hair against her shoulders as a breeze picked up.

She blinked. "Your favorite musical is about adultery?"

He frowned, snapping back to attention. "Well, I don't condone it, if that's what you're thinking."

"No," she said hastily. "I just...I don't understand. I thought the book was awful when Ashley lent it to me. I couldn't get through it."

"Sentimental reasons, in part," he explained. She arched an eyebrow, but Killian refused to elaborate. "And because sometimes love just doesn't work out."

"Love?" she echoed, wrinkling her nose. "More like selfishness."

"Some of both," he conceded, "But the adultery of the story aside, not all love works out or is meant to be."

"Things happen that we can't control," she murmured, watching him sideways. Her green eyes radiated with compassion.

"Yes."

She patted him on the arm. Killian's breath became unsteady, and a jolt of electricity shot through him at the gentle press of her fingers. "I know something about that."

"Oh?" he breathed, as she shifted and her shoulder brushed against his. She hadn't moved her hand. _Why_ hadn't she moved her hand? he thought feverishly. His breath hitched, and when he spoke, it was with an unsteady voice. "How so? Have you ever been in love?"

"I meant about...things being out of our control," she said quietly, sadness sparking in her eyes. Killian resisted the urge to pull her close and kiss away her sadness. The fact that she was touching him at all-_still_-was surreal enough. And inappropriate. And problematic.

And Killian didn't give a single fuck about it right now.

She drew her hand away, frowning down at his arm. Killian followed her gaze. The dark ink of his tattoo peeked out from the sleeve of his jacket, and before he could even think to stop her, she had pushed the sleeve up to reveal it in more detail. "Who's Milah, on the tattoo?"

"Someone from long ago," he hedged in a flat tone, startled into reasserting all the walls and boundaries that had crumbled moments before. He drew his arm away, sliding sleeve of his jacket back down.

"Where is she?"

"She's gone."

"It was a car accident, wasn't it?" she said softly. "That's why it was so important to you that I didn't drive or go back with Neal and his friends. Someone got drunk and took her from you."

Killian felt the muscles in his jaw tense up at just how accurately she'd guessed.

"And she's the reason you like that musical," Emma continued. "The book was her favorite, wasn't it?"

"It was." He inhaled with a shudder. It had been years since he had spoken of Milah to anyone but Liam or Eric, and yet the words fairly tumbled out of his mouth with Emma. "She-we were engaged." Emma's expression became stricken. "Only two months, but-"

"I'm so sorry," she whispered, patting his arm again. There was no pity in the action, only empathy. Something for which Killian was profoundly grateful. He couldn't have stood it if she had pitied him, like everyone else did when they found out.

"Thank you," he nodded shortly. "It was a long time ago, actually." He scrubbed at the stubble on his chin.

"But it's not the sort of thing you ever get over," she said, practically reading his mind. "You just get better at learning to live with the pain. It becomes part of who you are. The new you."_ Because you are never the same after that_, her green eyes whispered to him.

_And there is no going back_, he agreed silently, watching her. His fingers twitched, itching to brush the hair back from her face and kiss her, like a real date. How extraordinary that sitting with her on this porch felt more like a genuine date to him than dinner and a concert with Tina had.

Her hand slipped away again, and he exhaled slowly, trying to rein his urges in and reassert control over his feelings. "So, um, has the reading been better for you?" he asked, returning to a safer topic, one that would remind him of his proper place in her life. The boundaries had already blurred and been crossed over quite a few times tonight. He was her professor, and he needed to act like it.

"Come on, it's the weekend," she groaned.

He grinned. "Point taken." Killian bit his lip absently as he searched for a new topic. "So. What does Emma Nolan like to do for fun?"

"Same as you, in some ways," she said with a dismissive sweep of her hand. "Sports. Theater. Musicals. Concerts. Reading. But fiction, mostly."

"I take it no poetry, then?" he laughed.

"Um," she said with a guilty look.

"That's all right," he chuckled. "I suppose it's not everyone's cup of tea." He gestured up at the stars. "I find poetry's rather like stargazing. At first, you can't see anything, and nothing makes sense whatsoever. But then, you develop a familiarity with the night sky, and you begin to pick a few things out. Eventually, there's a rapport, and it becomes...magical. A thing of beauty."

"That's...that's...it's, um, I've never heard anything like that before," she faltered. Killian glanced over at her. "I wish I could see it that way," she added with a wistful expression, looking up at the stars.

He smiled, opening his mouth to reply, when he heard a car door slam. They both jumped. Chuckling, they cast each other sheepish smiles. "Sounds like your other roommate is home," he said. "I'd imagine he's better equipped to handle the current situation."

"Infinitely," she agreed with a relieved hitch to her voice.

"Emma?" Victor called out through the darkness. "Professor Jones?" he said in a startled voice. "What are you doing here?"

"He gave me a ride home," Emma answered, standing up as Victor walked toward them. Killian rose as well. "We ran into each other at the concert. Neal got drunk, and we had a fight."

"That fucking bastard," he growled. "I'll kick his ass."

"And neither of you roommates were answering your phones," she continued pointedly, "so Professor Jones chauffeured me home. Where the hell have you been?"

"With Ruby, that girl from poetry class. We ran into each other at the Breen's," he answered absently. "What's going on? Why are you out here? Did you lock yourself out?"

Killian and Emma exchanged a look.

"Not exactly," she murmured as Victor shoved past them, footsteps echoing loudly on the porch.

"That son of a bitch!"

Emma felt inclined to agree until she realized that Victor said it with relief and admiration rather than annoyance.

"It's about bloody time," Killian agreed.

"I can't believe you two!" she complained.

"We're men," Killian pointed out. "How else should we react?"

"You could at least gloat and celebrate when I'm out of earshot," she grumped.

"Calm down, I'll take care of this," Victor reassured her with a mixture of amusement and sympathy. "I'll be back shortly." He disappeared into the townhouse.

Killian looked at Emma. She smiled at him uncertainly. "Thanks for the ride," she told him again. "And for sitting with me."

He nodded, placing his hands inside his jacket pockets. It was far too tempting to touch her, to do things that would only end in disaster for them both. But he wanted to. Oh, how he wanted to. "Of course," he managed, swallowing back the reply that it had all been his pleasure. "If you, um, need a ride again sometime, you have the number."

"Oh." A shy expression settled on her face. "Um. I'll put it in my phone, then. Just in case."

"Probably a good idea," he agreed in a soft voice, gazing down into her eyes with longing. "So you don't lose it."

"That would be bad," she murmured, "wouldn't it?"

"Aye."

She took a step forward, and Killian's heart thumped with fear and desire. "I'd better go," he withdrew suddenly, backing up. "Victor should return shortly."

"Right."

"So, um, I'll be going," he said awkwardly.

"Okay."

They stared at each other for a moment longer, until the front door opened again.

"They're asleep," Victor informed his roommate. "Come on in."

Killian waved at them. "I'll see you both in class on Monday. Have a good weekend. " He walked back to his car and unlocked it, glancing back at the townhouse. Emma had already gone inside.

_What the hell am I going to do?_ he wondered as he pulled the door shut and buckled up. He started the car and back out of the parking space. He couldn't seem to stop it. All the teasing and flirting simply happened before he knew what he was even about.

_I have to do something,_ he thought. _I need an outlet. Some way in which I can pour out my feelings without risking my job._

Writing was the obvious answer, and yet the last time that he had written anything, it had been about Emma. Which only made the situation worse. Perhaps Liam was right. Killian fell too hard, felt too deeply. No wonder his responses to Emma were so automatic, so uncontrolled. Was Liam right about the other things as well? He reviewed the grudging conversation he had had with his brother, and his breath caught in his throat as his brother's words echoed in his head: _I know what I'm seeing,_ he'd said. Then, later, _I know what I saw back there. _The entire conversation on the porch, with all its words, looks, and touches took on an entirely new meaning as the pieces fell into place.

Emma was attracted to him, too.

It seemed almost too much to hope for. And it was quite a frightening thing to contemplate, besides. No matter how Emma felt, whether his attraction to her was returned or not, he couldn't act on it. Not overtly. He'd lose his job. And Killian loved his job. Loved Farrenton, and the friends he had made here.

No, if he chose to act on these feelings, he would have to be discreet. Just because he felt something for Emma, that didn't mean that she ever had to know. And really, it was better that she didn't. He could write for an outlet, perhaps send her the products of his efforts anonymously. He'd show her what it was to be cherished and adored by someone, to be treated properly and appreciated.

He felt relieved, once he'd made the decision, like a weight had been removed from his shoulders. Rather than fight his feelings, this attraction, he could embrace them-at least to some extent. And perhaps it would inspire Emma to dump Neal and choose someone better next time. Even if it wasn't him.

Since it could never be him.

Killian returned to his apartment a short while after that, whistling softly to himself as he unlocked the door. He felt lighter, energized even, though it was nearly two in the morning. He prepared for bed as usual, and fell asleep moments after his head hit the pillow. He slumbered restfully for the first time in ages, without nightmares about Milah's accident, and awoke the next morning feeling hopeful, even downright chipper.

He did little else but write for the rest of the weekend.

* * *

**A/N: Well, that's the end of it. In the next chapter, Emma will get her first anonymous note. Until next time, dearies!**


End file.
